St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1887-09-11
five MILLS BURNED.
A Terrific Illumination of the
Front Of the Expo
Sition.
The East Side Lumbering Plat
form, With Five Mills,
Destroyed.
Loss Of About $25O,00O, With
Insurance Of Half That
Sum.
A Flood in Arizona DESTROYS
Twenty Miles Of Railway
Track.

On NiCollet island, between the river
and PillSbury 4 mill, Minneapolis, is Il
pile of smoking and Smoldering ruins,
representing q loss of about S250.000. Yes
erday morning the place was occupied
by five saw mills, turning out an aver
age of 1,CC0,0G0 feet of lumber a day,
and forming one of the places of inter-
est i'll Mi nneapOlis. Now the buildings
are leveled to the ground, and the scene
is indeed desolate one. About I As
last evening fire was discovered in the
mill of McMulIen u Co., Oh Nicollet
island, near the East side pumping sta
ton. An alarm was sent i'll immedi-
ately, but before the department ar
rived the building was q mass of flames.
Next to this mill was that of Eastman Il
BOVey'S; then came c. a. Smith IL Co. IS,
Cole Il Weeks and Merriman Il Bar
rows. The flames jumped from one
to another with lightning rapidity,
and inside of fifteen minutes
from the time the fire was first discov
cred all five mills were blazing fiercely,
lighting up the surrounding territory
until objects half Il mile distant were
plainly visible. A second alarm was
turned i'll about three minutes after the
first one, and in response all the ell
gines except those in the outlying dis
trictS came to the scene of the con-
fiagration. But the firemen worked at
big disadvantage, not being able to
approach the mills from the side near
est the river, and were bothered to some
extent by the dense crowds which
surged around in front of PillSbury A
mill and on the roadway leading to the
pumping station. AS soon as the po-
lice arrived, however, patrol lines were
formed and the crowd gradually pushed
back until there was space enough to
work in. But all efforts to save the
buildings OF their contents were useless,
as the flames had gained full control.
Building by building fell, and gradually
the platform upon which the mills
stood sank lower and lower until it fell
by pieces into the water beneath. In
some of the mills were stored few
barrels of oil, and. as the
fire reached them, an explosion
would take place and millions
of brilliant sparks, which rivaled the
Exposition fireworks, would shoot sky
ward. A big blazing brand, lifted high
in the air by the slight breeze which
was blowing, fell upon the roof of the
old John Rawlins house, near the Phe-
nix mill, known as the Pioneer house,
in ST. Anthony, and before a stream
could be turned on it, set the building
on fire. The roof and one wall were
quite badly burned. Salisbury, Rolf &
Co., the pop manufacturers, whose
works are back OF the Phoenix mills, are
the owners. Kennedy'S blacksmith shop,
adjoining the Rawlins house, was also
slightly damaged. The heat from the
burning mill ignited blacksmith shop
owned by the Union Iron works, just
above the mills, and in few minutes
the building was in ashes. A small
horse shed next to the blacksmith shop
was also burned. The bridging was all
burned off of the East channel dam,
owned by the ST. Anthony Water Power
company, and the heads of the gates,
causing severe loss. When the flames
were at their height it became nOised
around that there were several pounds
of dynamite i'll the big tunnel in front
of tie mills, and Immediately there was
large-sized scattering. AS soon as the
flames got under full Roadway it was
found impossible to remove any of the
lumber in the mill yards, and conse-
quently it burned, together with the
wagons used in carrying it away, which
were owned by jerome Chute and Simp-
son Il Co. The mills were erected some
fifteen year ago, and had a capacity of
100000 feet every ten hours, as follows:
McMullen d Co., 100000; Eastman 81
Bovey, 100000; G. A. Smith q Co.,
10000; Merriman& BarrOWS. 21O.-
000. In all the mills there were some
100000 feet of sawed lumber, all of
which is total loss. The flames origi-
mated in McMullen & Co.'s mill, but in
what manner could not be learned.
The mill had not been running for
some three hours before the flames
broke out. and the proprietorS are
at loss to understand the matter. The
total loss on mills, logs and lumber, is
about 100000. almost evenly distributed
among the owners of the various mills.
Each mill was constructed at cost of
$4,000, or a little over, some fifteen
years ago, and have changed hands once
OF twice since then. The insurance is
between $4,000 and $4,000 on each mill,
distributed among various companies:
Eastman, Bovey I: Co.
Phoenix, of Brooklyn. ........... 49,. So, 900
National, of Hartford 49,. ...... 500
Niagara, of New York. 900
John Martin
Phoenix, of Brooklyn. 81 500
McMullen & Co.
National. -. ................. 81 800
The burned out mills were also in
sured in the syndicate, as follows: w.
w. Eastman in Phoenix, London, 81, 500;
American, Philadelphia, $1,000; Ger
man-American, $500; Queen. Liver
pool, 50, 800; Liverpool, London & Globe,
$4,000; Royal, LOO; Springfield, s., 500;
Detroit, $1,000; Boylston, 81 600; Ma
tional, New York, S1,0G0; Anglo-Ne-
v.da 81 500; Hamburg. Bremen, 81 GOO;
Underwriters, New York, sl,5OO. In
the Millers & Manufacturers Mutual.
herriInaD RarrOyvS & % yunra ipc,,roI